16 
REPORT OF TPIE 
the Museum almost entirely dependant upon donations, and 
the occasional purchase of such fossils as its funds would per¬ 
mit. But the railway now in progress to Scarborough, with its 
branches to Whitby and Bridlington, besides passing through 
the well known Oolite districts of Malton and Pickering, will 
greatly facilitate the means of communication with the three 
richest spots on the coast; and in anticipation of the facility 
likely to be thus afforded for obtainins: the fossils of the 
c' O 
Yorkshire Oolites and Lias, a correspondence has already 
been opened with the collectors of Mountain Limestone fos¬ 
sils, a depa,rtment in which, taking into consideration the 
number of species known to occur in the county, the Museum 
has been greatly deficient. 
Although the whole district of Yorkshire, from its numerous 
fossiliferous rocks and vmued physical phenomena, every where 
offers materials for further research, yet there are two subjects 
connected with its geology, upon which more information is 
particularly wamted. These are the relations of the Tertiary 
strata superimposed upon the Chalk at Bridlington, to similar 
deposits, but more largely developed, in Norfolk and Suffolk, 
and a better acquaintance with the fossils of that extremely 
interesting bed on the coast, known as the Speeton Clay. 
Great accessions have been made to the Geological depart¬ 
ment of the Museum during the past year. Several opportu¬ 
nities have occurred, enabling the Council to enrich the col¬ 
lection of Yorkshire fossils, in both the vertebrate and inverte¬ 
brate series, at a moderate cost; whilst the additions received 
through donations have been unusually numerous and valu¬ 
able. 
On the list of contributions which call for particular notice, 
is the episternal bone of the gigantic species of land-tortoise 
found by Captain Cautley and Dr. Falconer in the Tertiary 
Siwallic Hills of Northern India, and which, from its enor¬ 
mous dimensions, has been described by its discoverers under 
the name of Colossochelys Atlas. It is to Dr. Falconer that 
the Society is indebted for this acquisition, not less valuable 
